Asias naval arms race is heating up again; India has joined Japan and China by launching an aircraft carrier to aid its mass of troops and weaponry along the border with China and Pakistan.

india-military-china-borderChina and Japan have both launched carriers, and China has started work on its first large aircraft carrier. Now India has launched its own carrier, called the Vikrant. The Vikrant is the first aircraft carrier built in India, and its launch prompted at least one Chinese newspaper to demand the construction of more carriers in China. India Deploying Massive Force to Chinese Border

The carrier race is only the latest escalation in the potential conflict between Asian powers. India recently approved the deployment of 50,000 soldiers to its border with China and Pakistan in Kashmir. The troops are combat forces equipped with such state of the art equipment as CJ-130J Hercules transport planes that could carry an invasion force into Chinese territory.

The conflict between China and India is potentially dangerous because China has occupied 38,000 square miles of Indian territory in the Himalayas since the 1960s. China and India actually fought a war back then that ended in a humiliating defeat for India. The Chinese claim that India is occupying part of their territory in Arunchal Pradesh. Thats not true; Arunchal Pradesh was occupied by the British and was never part of the Chinese Republic.

The Indians are also staging a large-scale military buildup in their state of West Bengal, which is also near the Chinese border. In other words, thousands of heavily armed troops are facing each other across the Chinese and Indian borders and nobody is paying attention.

Whats worse is that the U.S. government seems to be doing little or nothing to defuse this situation. Instead, its turning its back, possibly because American companies profit by selling weapons and equipment to India. The CJ-130J transport planes the Indian army uses are made in the United States by Lockheed Martin.

This situation bears watching even if the U.S. media is pretending it doesnt exist. This massive military buildup is similar to the one in Europe in the early 1900s that preceded the outbreak of World War I. The situation is even more dangerous because a very unstable nation with a large and very capable armyPakistanis also involved.

Instead, its turning its back, possibly because American companies profit by selling weapons and equipment to India. The CJ-130J transport planes the Indian army uses are made in the United States by Lockheed Martin.

Yeah right. Pure BS. So what is the US supposed to do. India is free to put troops wherever it wishes. When Bush was President it was cowboy diplomacy to go into Iraq even though there were UN snactions being trumpled, assassination attempt on former President and concern about WMDs being used on us. Now the US is supposed to invade Libya and Syria without UN resolutions and micro-manage troop deployments in India. What a crock.

First of all, the “Vikrant” is at present nothing more than the hull. Not even the “island” has been built yet, and it has no engines. On the other hand, the “Arihant”, India’s first indigenous nuclear sub, is already at the sea-trials stage, and could theoretically be used in combat if they had to. India does already have a small carrier in service, though it’s old and past its retirement date (delayed because it’s replacement is that ex-Soviet carrier that Russia has been dicking around with for the past 4 years).

Second, the C-130 is hardly “state-of-the-art”.

Yes, India has authorized and is deploying a new “mountain” division to the border, but it’s not just in Kashmir. They’re sending part of it to Sikkim, and part to Arunachal Pradesh in the Northeast.

Boy, this puts Obama in a quandary. The Chinese are Communist, but have very few Muslims. The Indians are democratic, but a significant minority of their population is Muslim. But then again, Pakistan is allied with China, and they are entirely Muslim.

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